Modern cargo ships more and more frequently carry their loads in large rectangular boxes referred to as containes. These containers are normally made of steel or some other metal material and are strengthened to withstand stacking upon each other and a variety of forces imparted to the container by virtue of the vessel's motion while at sea. These containers come in a variety of sizes, however, a size of 20 L by 8 W by 8 H is considered an industry standard.
These cargo containers are moved about by cranes by means of a bridle or spreader suspended from the crane having hooks or locking pins which engage eyes formed in the upper corners of the containers. The crane raises the bridle to hoist the container aloft and move it to a desired location for stacking or loading. In storage, the containers are usually stacked one upon another and the stacks are placed side-by-side to from rows of containers. Devices known in the art as "cones" are used to join and lock the upper corners of adjacent containers and thereby prevent accidental slippage or displacement of containers. These "cones" are placed or removed by workmen who climb atop and then traverse across the tops of the stacks of containers. This prior manual method of connecting or unlocking containers created a potential safety problem for the workmen.
In order to provide a means for preventing the workmen from being exposed to injury resulting from traversing across the tops of the stacked containers, it has been known to utilize a safety cage within which the workmen are held while working on the stacked containers. Such a safety cage is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,705,140. Although safety cages such as that disclosed in U.S. Pat. 4,705,140 provide an improved work safety environment for workmen engaged in locking and unlocking the stacked containers, these types of safety cages still require the workmen to climb about the safety cage in order to engage the hooks from the container handling bridle or spreader with the engaging eyes formed in blocks in the upper corners of the cage frame. Previously a workman who was in the safety cage was required to climb upon the cage and individually fasten the hook in each corner of the container handling bridle into its respective engaging eyes in the corner blocks. During the course of this fastening operation in which the container handling bridle or spreader was placed into locking engagement with the top of the safety cage the workman was exposed to the possible hazard of slipping or otherwise falling either within or without the safety cage. The present invention eliminates this problem by providing for an improved safety cage latching mechanism which allows the workman to safely engage the safety cage to the cargo handling bridle by means of a single engagement movement which is undertaken safety within the confines of the safety cage itself.